Kaitlyn’s Reviews > Homage to Catalonia > Status Update

“One of the most horrible features of war is that all the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting…The people who wrote pamphlets against us and vilified us in the newspapers all remained safe at home, or at worst in the newspaper offices of Valencia, hundreds of miles from the bullets and the mud.”

He has a similar humor to that I’ve seen in soldiers of the First World War—a kind of sardonic cynicism that criticizes everything on every front, yet does not struggle against it. It’s pretty hilarious at times.

I’ve never considered the potential of ‘revolutionary’ discipline, as Orwell describes it. I found myself doubting the structure, or lack thereof, of a classless fighting force. And almost instantly I’m reprimanded by Orwell. Justifiably so. It’s fascinating how ingrained these systems of fear-based discipline are in my understanding of military structure—and I’ve never even been in the military.